Letters to the Editor
Silenced
Published Letters: 1358 Editor's Choice: 75
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Look who wants a piece of Britney now
[Read the article: Their terrifying sounds]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Using Britney Spears' name to get attention for your book review? That's pretty low.
It's a good article. You could have promoted it on its own merits, you know.
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I'm really more of an opera fan myself
[Read the article: Their terrifying sounds]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The LA Opera seems to be doing quite well right now.
As for contemporary opera, I hated Dr. Atomic because all the issues it dealt with had been hashed out already in the sixties and seventies.
What Dr. Atomic needed was Indian and Pakistani weapons physicists singing about their own precious bombs from swings overhead.
It also needed real female characters. And the bomb should have a few lines too.
Grendel I loved but they need to trim it by about 15 minutes. Existential musing can only go on for so long. That's the law.
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One problem with contemporary music
[Read the article: Their terrifying sounds]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Look at Dr. Atomic. Sure it takes place in the modern world, but it takes place in the forties, and its sensibility is really the sixties, or the eighties at best.
There's nothing in that opera that refers to the contemporary experience of nuclear weapons. My friends and I didn't like it because it just felt so dated. It fell in that region between current and historical, where it just feels dated.
It's risky to try to keep up with the modern world in classic music and opera, because the modern world is changing so fast.
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The ticking time bomb scenario is dishonest
[Read the article: What Hillary won't say about torture]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]In the era of DNA we now know that many innocent people have confessed to crimes they didn't commit, under duress from law enforcement.
I cannot imagine how torture could yield information of such unquestionably highly reliable quality that it could actually be useful and applicable in a real time crunch situation like a literal ticking bomb.
In that case, I would think that if you did have the correct suspect at hand -- not something that is completely guaranteed -- then the terrorist in question would be too happy about your powerlessness to care about his own pain.
But whether or not you have the right suspect -- how could you vet the information you got in such a short amount of time?
Information isn't guaranteed to be correct merely because it was extracted under duress.
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Roberts' concerns seem so dated and quaint compared with today
[Read the article: "American Gangster"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]His dual enemies are drug traffickers (Lucas is so canny and elusive that for most of the movie, Roberts has no idea who he's really looking for) and the crooked cops who are more concerned with making money off those traffickers than with catching them
If you set the story in northern Mexico, then his circle of concern would widen to include the army that's been sent in to replace the crooked drug cops, and is now accused of raping and torturing civilians.
That's the problem with a movie like this. Who really cares if you knock the CEO out of business? There's always a senior vice president waiting for his turn. And who cares if you get rid of one corrupt cop? There's always another waiting to replace him.
Nothing the hero does can ever really change the situation. So he never really gets to be a hero.
Mexico got rid of all their drug cops, period, because they all got corrupted by the cartels. But now they have to deal with rape and torture by a corrupted army. Whoopee!
I wonder what kind of "drug dealer vs. drug cops" movie we'll get next. I suppose eventually we'll get a movie about northern Mexico, if it still exists by the time the movie gets made.
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Wrong, anonymous
[Read the article: "American Gangster"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I love gangster movies. I just hate it when Americans fall for utopian schemes and end up empowering gangsters and gangsterizing our entire culture.
When was the last time we saw a shooting war between alcohol manufacturing gangs?
Gee, um, I think the last time that happened was when alcohol was illegal.
I love gangster movies.
The problem is, Americans seem determined to live inside of one. This I just do not understand.
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She's already backing out on medical marijuana, fantastic
[Read the article: The era of Hillary begins]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]First she promised to end the dispensary raids. Now she's calling for more research.
So we can repeat the cycle all over again. Her husband called for more research. So he ordered the IOM report. And when it didn't confirm the administration's point of view, it was tossed aside and then Al Gore lied about the conclusions in 2000.
So she wants to start that whole process all over again?
Well she's going to be surprised. Back when the IOM report was published, those doctors still expected evidence to turn up that smoking pot will cause lung cancer.
Instead the science has gone the other way. No lung cancer, no emphysema. And now it looks like THC beats Aricept when it comes to blocking beta amyloid plaques. And kills ten kinds of cancer cells and maybe even cures a prion infection of all things.
Sure, hey, let's have more research.
All that's going to do, Hillary, is buy you time at the expense of innocent people.
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The ticking time bomb is complete bulldoodoo
[Read the article: When waterboarding was a crime]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]A terrorist wants power. The most powerful situation a terrorist can be in is when the bomb is about to go off and nobody can stop it.
I can't imagine a terrorist giving in to torture right when he's at his most powerful.
That's a fantasy that torture will make a terrorist give up right when he's at his peak of power.
It's a fantasy that gives people a false sense of security but actually puts them in greater danger.
If you're counting on torture to keep you safe -- then you're an idiot and you're not safe and you're not capable of keeping anyone else safe either.